Yu-Gi-Oh! Hidden Arsenal: Terminal Rebirth
by NovaBlazerZX
Summary: Legends say that the mysterious continent of Termina rose from a meteor coming from space. Eventually it was revealed to be a part of a distant planet, where wars raged for centuries. A grand tourney begins in the land, as 4 young, chosen duelists, will find themselves entwined in the midst of a reenactment of those very legends, with battles beyond what was once a mere game.
1. Prologue: The Legend of DT

Long ago, in the depths of a distant galaxy, stood a mysterious world; a celestial body formed by the will of an unknown, powerful deity. The planet was enriched with many forms of land, vast oceans, grand cities, and advanced technology that extended towards every realm. With each realm possessing their fair share of great influence, power, and resources, it was only naturally that many sought to take dominion over it all. Driven by mutually similar desires, the 4 strongest, and most influential clans of the world's various creatures waged war after war against each other in an unending struggle for rule. These groups are: the Wind Sages of Mist Valley, the Grand Order of the Ice Barrier clan, the war-born flame manipulators of the Flamvell tribe, and the legendary band of swordmen known as the X-Sabers.

As the grand-scale conflict of the 4 tribes continued, it seemed that all hope for peace and unity was beyond reach. However, this once predetermined fate would soon change upon the arrival of a group of grotesque, vile creatures known as the Worms. Overwhelmed not only by the Worms race's ferocity, and near-limitless numbers, but also by the many other unknown tribes either cowering away in fear or committing acts of betrayal, the 4 tribes struggled against such an invasion.

Fully aware of each of their limitations, the leaders of the Flamvell, Mist Valley, Ice Barrier, and X-Saber tribes decided to form a temporary truce, and by pulling together their strengths and technological advancements, the union of the Allies of Justice was formed. With their newfound alliance, the 4 tribes led the charge against the invaders, gradually retaking what was lost.

This was the legend long told by the those who have discovered what remained of the mysterious planet.

A great many millenia has passed since the ancient lore of what is now known as the planet Duel Terminal. These lores were discovered, as a mysterious, colossal meteorite crash-landed upon the human realm, and oddly enough, the enormous body was filled with several forms of land ranging from volcanic marshes, barren deserts, freezing icecaps, open canyons, and much more. The abundance in resources was beyond what anyone could even imagine. News of this quickly brought voyagers and scholars from all over the world, seeking to unlock the hidden mysteries and secrets deep within the land's boundaries. Eventually,like its mother planet foretold in legends, the massive rock was labeled as the continent of Termina.

Grand cities emerged within the following years, and people all over Termina seemed to have settled in peace, however surges of violent instincts mysteriously overcame them. Just as the many tribes in the planet Duel Terminal fought, man too committed similar wrongs driven by greed, bloodlust, anger, fear, and hatred. As the wars on the continent dragged on, few individuals stepped up in desperation to derail their people from destruction, for just like the tribes, an alliance was formed to band those whom were willing to restore peace. With conflicts nearing their end, the people of Termina finally agreed to negotiate with each other, hoping that everyone would come to equal terms.

Through the use of various treaties, the Fuh-Rin-Ka-Zan Union was formed and the people of Termina returned to their respective lands, agreeing to help each other in whatever way necessary. The land soon divided equal ownerships to 4 different factions; the Aoi, Kurenai, Miyabi, and Kurogane regions.

The industrious Kurenai faction took charge in the production of machinery, weapons, and power sources for the union.

The Miyabi Faction sought to preserve nature and agriculture, and was also a cornerstone that advocated peace.

The Aoi Faction held much of the ancient scriptures and lores that are constantly researched and recorded by numerous scholar, seeking to use the knowledge gained for generations to come, Aoi faction also takes charge of preserving clean water and undersea life, and serves as the union's strategic center against foreign enemies.

The Kurogane faction's lands are rich in minerals for mining, thus contributing greatly to Termina's wealth. It also the union's center of defense, housing the order of the Allies of Justice, comprised of a group of individuals seeking to enforce and ensure that peace and order remain in and out of Termina's borders.

These 4 nations are ultimately connected through the capital of Doriado City located at the heart of the continent .

Doriado City ties these 4 groups together through sharing information, trading, distributing resources, and serves as the embodiment of laws in which all of the factions are expected to follow. It is here where the leaders of the continent meet and take action on whatever needs to be done. Through this reborned union, Termina prospered for many years. However, who is to say that conflict will surely not strike again? For where there is peace in the hearts of man, destruction also sleeps, awaiting the day it arises from its slumber.

Yu-Gi-Oh! Hidden Arsenal: Terminal Rebirth


	2. Chapter 1: Scarlet Soul Challenger

Many years have passed since Termina's newfound union was established, and daily life across the continent has been peaceful. With old wars and grudges long past, the legends of the Duel Terminal world among many other lores were now looked upon as mere folktales, and much of their existence only remained through the most popular trading card game spanning the globe for many years known as Duel Monsters. Since its first release in Termina, Duel Monsters has been the game of choice for various age groups, genders, and cultures, providing a worldwide competitive aspect that would better serve as a means to settle issues as opposed to resorting to violence.

To reinforce the sport of dueling, the leaders of Termina's divisions decided that every few years, a major tournament would be held in the capital of Doriado City known as the DT Grand Championships, where only the most prestigious duelists across Termina and beyond are given the honor of participating. It is here that the 4 Factions not only compete for sport, but to also settle their major disputes, with control over high positions and monopolies on resources often being put on the line. Naturally, many duelists striving for the glory, honor and riches that can be obtained through victory, are greatly driven into participating. However, with several possible candidates vying to strive for such lavish rewards, the decision to determine the most qualified players to participate in the DT Grand Championships is determined through a series of regional tournaments held within each of the 4 faction's respective lands, as well as a few held outside Termina's borders. Right now, the time for harvesting those destined for glory draws near, as few chosen duelists will find themselves entwined by a fate that which extends beyond the depths of what was once believed to be a mere child's game.

Chapter 1: Enter, the Scarlet Soul Challenger; Kageru Hinodama

It was a clear afternoon in Doriado City, and large crowds of people have gathered to witness the beginning of the DTGC Regional Qualifier series which are currently being held in several stadiums all over Doriado City. It is in each of these tournaments, that duelists from across the world prove whether or not they are fit to compete in one of the few Regional Tournaments leading up to the DTGC. Right now, many aspiring duelists who have long prepared for this eventful day are gathered, hastily finishing preparations in order to face the challenges ahead. One of these duelists; a passionate youth makes his entrance.

The automatic sliding doors of the Eastern Stadium of Doriado City opened, and a young man stpped inside. He was 18 years of age with short, black hair, red eyes, and wore a red and white colored jacket with a light grey shirt underneath, and jet black jeans. Two sets of small bandages layed across the boy's face; one at the very center of his nose, and another flattened upon his left cheek. This young duelist, born with an eager, fiery soul that burned brightly through his proud expression, was named Kageru Hinodama.

"Alright! I I'm still pretty early." Kageru sighed, relieved at his timely arrival. "Now I just gotta look for Gai." he thought, searching the area around him.

It was an eventful sight. The stadium hallways were long and broad, with rows of registration aisles, ticket lines, food courts, gift shops, and a few small stores selling cards among others were lined up all over, taking advantage of the big event to make profit.

"...Wow..." Kageru looked around with amazement at the large crowd of spectators moving to their seats, and duelists making last minute preparations for their decks at the nearby tables. "Haha! This is pretty awesome! The local tourneys at the card shops during the weekends don't even compare.." he chuckled, unable to contain his excitement "This where I can finally show my stuff! Man... I can't wait! Somebody start this tourney already!" he thought.

"Hey! Kageru!" a familiar voice yelled aloud. Kageru smiled heartily and turned his attention to the boy who appeared to be around his age. The boy had curly brown hair, brown eyes, wore a pair of eye glasses, and a grey coat. Kageru waved and greeted back to whom turned out to be his best friend "Gai! Haha it's you! How are ya man?"

Gai returned the greeting with equal enthusiasm "Great! I haven't seen you in a long while. Gaack!" he suddenly choked for a brief second and chuckled as Kageru clenched his neck tightly in a friendly manner "Whew.. You're still pretty rough as always" he remarked.

"Heh. And I see you're still packing a laundry load as usual" Kageru replied with a tease, noticing that Gai brought with him both a large, black backpack and a grey suitcase. "What's all this stuff for?" He asked "Do you still have to do some work here for your old man or something?"

Gai glanced at his belongings and explained "Oh these? No. I told you that I only needed to help dad at Arsenal Tech for a few months." He began punching in a series of codes on his suitcase as he continued talking "The company has been pretty short-handed with general maintainance since the staff are too occupied with developing the new duel disks. I just brought my equipment in case your disk needed fixing, I mean you did tell me a few days ago that it has a few bugs."

"Nothing too major" Kageru replied as he began pointing at the problematic areas in his duel disk "Just that the holograms are kinda fuzzy, sometimes my extra deck slot get's a bit jammed. Oh, and the last game I played, my monster suddenly just had an ATK of 2733" his curiousity then shifted to what Gai last mentioned "So... new duel disks huh?... Oh yeah! Didn't you mention something like that over the Comm. Terminal just recently? So what are they like?" he asked with wonder.

Gai raised his shoulders and smiled with embarrassment, unable to give even a vague answer "To be honest I don't really know Hehe."

Kageru twitched his right eye, feeling suspicious of Gai. He could not believe that someone like his best friend would not know any information of the sort, and so he kept prying "Oh Come on! You told me your dad was leading the development team! Spill it already Omokawa! You get info like this all the time don't you?"

"Hey! Whoah! Calm down." Gai leaned away slightly, trying hard to convince Kageru that he had nothing to hide "My dad wouldn't tell me much, since all the higher ups wanted to keep the info classified till the end of all the opening prelims. He knew good and well I'd break a secret if my friends started mobbing around me for info, so he decided not to tell me anything this time."

Finally convinced of his friend's honesty, Kageru backed away with a lingering look of impatience "Man, that's kinda lame". He then removed the dark grey duel disk holstered on his left arm and had Gai work on it, for it was still a few more hours before the prelims would begin.

The two sat at a nearby table at a food court as Gai proceeded to take out a few tools so that he can get started on working. They continued their chat, and for the first few minutes, they began by sharing recent stories about life, school, and their friends, and even exchanging a few laughs in the process. Kageru couldn't help but be amazed at Gai's skill and knowledge with machines, and technical equipment, and often complimented at how quick he worked even in the midst of a conversation. Within the next hour, Kageru's duel disk was fully functioning again. Gai finished up by rewinding a few screws before returning it to his friend "That oughtta do it. This old thing should be up and ready for the tourney now. Why don't you try it for a spin and see how it runs?"

Kageru gladly accepted "Sweet! Thanks Gai. As always, you're the man." he then activated the duel disk, and rechecked if any of the problems would reoccur as well as for any additional issues. After looking all over, he smiled with great joy, seeing at how well Gai did "All clear. Right! Now I'm ready to go!" he exclaimed with his disk raised up in excitement.

Gai nodded with satisfaction, knowing he had helped a friend without any mishaps. Just then, the phone in his right pocket began to ring. "Hello?" Gai answered the call, which came from none other than his and Kageru's good friend Tetsu Karaka "So what's up?" Gai asked. His eyes suddenly widened with shock just seconds after Tetsu with a frantic, worried tone spoke on the other end. "Yeah.. Kageru's here too. Don't worry, we'll be on it right away Tetsu"

Seeing Gai's expression, Kageru assumed that something was amiss "What's up? Is Tetsu alright?" he asked.

Gai quickly placed the phone back into his pocket hastily and answered "It's Tetsu's little brother. He's gone missing."

"Katsu?! Wasn't he supposed to be with him during the prelims?"

Gai then quickly explained, using what little information Tetsu gave them to plan their approach "He said that they got separated in the middle of a 's a little time left before the prelims start, and Katsu shouldn't be far. Tetsu's almost done searching the upper half of this place, so we should split up and search around here".

Kageru couldn't have agreed more and nodded "Sounds good".

Two went along their search, looking around, and asking questions to anyone who may have spotted Tetsu's brother. Fortunately, there were a few people that saw him running amidst the crowds. They pointed the two towards Katsu's direction, however these people were also on their way to report that a group of men wearing brown leather jackets, and faces that spelled out troubled seemed to be chasing the boy. Using their newfound information, Kageru and Gai met up back at their starting point and together they rushed on towards Katsu's rescue.

"Hey Gai, they said it was around at the main square right?" Kageru asked as they ran, wanting to confirm that they both were given the same directions.

"Yeah. They said, they saw Katsu running around here, although he looked pretty worried they said. Who do you think may be after him?"

"Not sure". Kageru replied. A thought had suddenly hit him "Say... Gai... When we met a few years ago you told me, that Tetsu's from the Kurogane region right?" he quickly asked.

Gai found this question a somewhat irrevelant to the situation "Yeah, and my family originally came from Miyabi. Why?" he asked "You sure you don't have an idea of who these guys are?"

Kageru's face suddenly turned more serious, his eyes deep in thought, as if he had an answer "It's just a hunch" he vaguely replied "At least... I hope it's just a hunch... All I know is tha- Uh!? Whoah!" due to his brief loss of awareness, Kageru had suddenly bumped into a stranger and fell, tumbling over the floor, nearly knocking Gai and a few other people down. He quickly came to, picked himself up, then apologized "Ooh. Hey man... sorry, my bad. You okay?" he asked with an embarassed look as face, as he reached an arm out to help the young man he had bumped into.

The person appeared to be around Kageru and Gai's age, although slightly taller than Kageru. He had fairly long, straight, brown hair, and amber colored eyes that seemed to shine with a faint, bright glow. He also wore a khaki colored safari jacket, a brown headband, decorated with many engravings, and dark green pants. He too felt embarrassed as he reached his arm for Kageru to help him up "Sorry, that was my fault too." he apologized in return, giving Kageru a courteous bow.

"Well, sorry to bug you." Gai added, trying to explain "We're looking for someone at the moment, so please excuse us. It's an emergency".

"I see. You too." said the boy. "Well, I'm sorry to say I can't help with that, but if you don't mind me asking, have you two by any chance seen a girl around here?" he asked with a similar look of urgency "She's a few years younger than me, bright, green hair and eyes, and she wears a long-sleeved, yellow blouse with a light blue ribbon, and a maroon skirt. She's my sister".

Kageru turned to Gai, who shrugged as neither of them have seen anyone fitting the young man's description. The person looked down in disappointment "I see... Well I need to go find her as well. She got separated from me in this crowd as well. Good luck on your search then." he added, wishing them well.

"You too". Gai replied with mutual empathy as the they went their separate ways.

The two boys arrived at the stadium's main square, where they were greeted by a seemingly large commotion taking place. Large groups of people were gathered, chanting, and screaming in an outrage towards who or whatever was in the middle of them. Gai and Kageru saw as some of the people within the crowd were getting ready to charge violently ahead, with only a few trying to restrain them.

"What the heck is going on here?" Gai asked a man staring at the view next to him.

The man looked at the scene in worried shame, as he explained the situation "Well, some bigmouth dirtbags just came in from Kurenai just a few days ago, and apparently they've been causing trouble whenever they spot someone from the other regions that isn't theirs. They were picking on a little boy from Kurogane. Luckily, some girl went in and stuck her neck out for the little guy, then a bunch of others joined in, and the whole thing has just been quite a mess for the past couple of minutes. Even security is in there, they're having a pretty tough time".

Kageru and Gai turned to each other, quickly realizing who now could be in great danger.

"Little boy?"

"Kurogane..."

"KATSU!"

The two immediately rushed in, squeezing their way through the enraged crowd and the security trying to hinder them. "Oh, owww, lemme go please! Oooff!" Gai struggled within the last moments, but was held by security towards the end, while Kageru on the other hand barely managed to make his way inside "Be careful in there buddy! Oww!" Gai warned aloud "Don't do anything crazy!"

Kageru went on ahead, and within seconds, he saw that Katsu was taking cover behind a teenage girl with bright, green hair, wearing a yellow blouse, facing a group of thirteen men in brown, leather jackets surrounding them. Kageru grinded his teeth with disdain at the sight of the group ganging up on the two and jumped in the middle of it. Everyone's eyes quickly shifted towards him as he yelled "Sooo! You pricks are still causing trouble huh!? Well,how bout you ladies dance with me instead! Come on!"

Gai face palmed himself with worry, seeing his friend doing the opposite of what he had just warned moments ago "Man Hinodama! I just told you not to do anything crazy".

"Kageru!" Katsu yelled with relief from behind the girl "You came!"

Kageru turned to the boy, giving him both a big smile, and a thumbs up, telling him that everything will be okay "Glad to your still up and walking little man! Don't worry, I'll take care of these punks!" he looked towards the girl and added "Thanks for helping him".

The group of men were talking amongst themselves, as one of them mocked "Coming to save your queen, and little prince kid!? Let's just see how tough you are hehehehe!" he grinned as a four of them started joining in, getting ready to gang up on Kageru.

Kageru looked with them angrily, crunching both sets of his knuckles, as he got ready to fight them all off "Yeah about that... So what's the big idea, picking on a girl and a kid huh!? You guys can't handle a real fight?" he mocked.

"That pile of dirt from the Kurogane stepped on our boss's nice new shoes!" one of them replied "We were just going to teach that trash some manners! Then again, I don't know if bunch of gold-digging, rock-munching, lame brains can even learn a thing or two!"

As the man said that, a good number of people that seemed to be from Kurogane amongst the crowd began yelling out back, throwing as many harsh insults as they could in return.

"What was that punk!?"

"Why don't you guys go back and jumped into one of those volcanoes you got back there if you all think your so hot!"

"What!? It's true ya know." the man added "We were gonna give the little snot a fair chance to fight back, but he doesn't even know how to duel. Then little miss sunshine over there from those tree-hugging Miyabi saps starts thinkin she's all tough and cuts in".

Kageru began clenching his fist tighter at hearing every word of it "After all these years. You guys still make me sick. The only ones who need to be taught manners is you pricks!"

One of the men looked at Kageru familiarly and whispered to whom looked to be the leader "Hey boss... Isn't that kid-"

The leader nodded with a sinister grin on his face, as he went to meet up with Kageru and give his greetings "I see you're back for another beating Kageru." he then called off the four surrounding them "You newbies are still too green. Even this little shrimp can take you on. If I were you guys, I'd back off".

Kageru glared at the man with spiky, gelled orange hair, and black eyes. The man wore a similar, but torn up brown jacket, and a pair of long, black pants, with a large, spiky belt that had a burning, green monster head emblem on its buckle. He kept his enraged gaze at him as he said greeted him by name "Daigo! I see you're still fine with leading a bunch of lowlife pushovers who can't get with the times huh?"

Daigo chuckled at his remark and countered "Yeah. And you're still the same old lone pup that needs to be dragged on a leash and beaten up before it starts behaving".

Kageru grinned back at Daigo, as he pulled out a deck "Funny... I thought I was little shrimp a few seconds ago. Now I'm a dog? Make up your mind moron!" he then activate placed the deck on his duel disk and activated it, calling to challenge him. "Anyways... How about I pay you guys back from before personally!"


End file.
